


i've been walking solo (a drabble collection)

by exceed



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Divination, Drabble Collection, Multi, Temporary Character Death, barely any capitol letters to be found here folks, voidfish static oh no
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-09
Updated: 2018-04-18
Packaged: 2019-03-28 22:56:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 3,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13913916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/exceed/pseuds/exceed
Summary: a gathering of all of my drabbles that aren't big enough for an actual fic! have fun!latest -  taako's not one to really change in his ways. even if everyone says he does change. fuck that.





	1. you got a wild high fire inside

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wowie i love this little drabble to death  
> starring magnus, although his name isn't stated  
> how do chapter notes work? i have no idea but here i am i guess, making a chaptered fic instead of many oneshots
> 
> enjoy!
> 
> the fic title is from without you by oh wonder  
> the chapter title is from for you by layla

fire is all around him, the sound like the echoes of a world long forgotten and foreign even to his own mind. grass ripples to frost at his feet, two powers roaring to life at his call. he could _never_ forget them, not after a day, a week, a month, a year, longer still-

and they were _there._  

they had left this plane on dark wings of death months ago but-

no.

this was not them, not quite.

this was the remnants of their renewed souls, three-score cycles old and new as a breath, a flash of a sly grin and fading laughter sounding from somewhere inside his chest as a spark set his enemies ablaze.

seven lengths away, he could see his sister- _not by blood, but by what mattered, by the warmth in his heart and the many years close to him_ \- he could see white hair framing her roughed-up face, shock frozen across those wide eyes, and he let his rage _scream_.

cackles sounded in his head, transmutation at his fingertips, a wish whispered from silence and flames pursuing their captors as the person dragging one of his hearts away _rippled_ into something-

he didn’t see what became of them.

magic was- a rush. he had none, he was as magicless as the dirt underneath his feet, plain as the grass and the trees and the leaves but- but he understood now. hysterical laughter, his own, could be heard above the din, as he saved what was his.

_you can’t take more of my family away. not this time._

this world, full of dark murmurs and ravenous eyes, had taken the twins, and he would not let it happen again.

(in his heart, with the magic swirling within him, he could sense their agreement.)

_me to mine._

the area erupted in howling frost and fire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im hungry for comments and validation, folks


	2. and i feel life for the very first time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Give Lucretia All The Love 2k18
> 
> title is from technicolour beat by oh wonder!

she was meant to observe.  
  
settled back at a meal, a journal in her hands, fast-paced chatter serving as a background to scratching on paper.  
  
quiet moments by herself, looking at the universe.  
  
the sharp smiles of the twins, the warm grin from magnus, the faint smiles that barry gave off when he wasn't paying attention-  
  
davenport's silent calm as they stood side by side, staring at the stars of new worlds.  
  
merle patiently teaching her how to care for plants, quiet reassurances in her ears.  
  
worry, panic, worthlessness- magnus' aggressively positive attitude chasing it away.  
  
picking up on knowledge from watching, spending nights discussing books with barry, taking time some days to let the conversations of her newfound family wash over her...  
  
teasing remarks from taako. sly grins from lup.  
  
letting her legs swing at the edge of a pool, flowers being tucked into her hair by merle.  
  
she did more now. what had happened? was the razor-sharp edge of her alert mind dulling?  
  
_("you're just becoming more comfortable with us, yeah, creesh?" magnus' smile was wide, soft in a way that he seemed to give off constantly. "you're basically my sister now, y'know. better get ready for more interaction, huh?"_  
  
_she had chucked and leaned back so he could hold her close, the hum of the starblaster and his steady breathing lulling her to sleep.)_  
  
she was so, so small, and the universe was so big.  
  
they had time. all they had was time.  
  
she could observe. she could take part.  
  
it'd be fine.  
  
_(mornings over tea, nights over coffee, working until she passed out, waking up some days to lup's beam and davenport's raised eyebrow and hearing merle's laugh-_  
  
_yeah. it would be alright in the end.)_


	3. caught up in an overflow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lucretia forgets; she is not the one to feed her journals to fisher this time.
> 
> title is from lose it by oh wonder!

the static follows her wherever she goes.

it buzzes underneath her skin and behind her eyes and she doesn’t feel whole but that static must complete her, right?

a sigh is let out and with it, that soft little prickle, that hum crackling at her fingertips and through her heart and in her mind.

she takes deep breaths and brandishes her pen, scratching faint lines into her journals under the light of the fuzzy _(wait-is-it-one-sun-yes-it-is)_ sun.

 

* * *

 

she meets a man one day, with a flowing red robe and a patch full of noise and sad, unhuman eyes. around him the disturbance interferes more, some sort of sign, and she stares at him with a wild look in her eyes.

he speaks, but words do not come out; instead, that noise, that interference springs further into life and she grins with the excitement of a woman who knows that this is _everything._

her soul feels a kinship with this static-crackle lich, and she makes a promise to keep in contact, makes him promise to send letters.

they know what’s behind the static, and she could too if she keeps in touch.

 

* * *

 

the familiar-but-strange lich finds her a year later in the thrall of static, hand grasping a tall staff and her mind in a haze. he is not that distortion in life anymore, not a creature beyond death, and in his casing of muscle and skin she can see that he is human.

others are with him but they do not matter. the noise in the back of her head has become a howling, scraping down the sides of her mind with a force that she does not understand.

the next moments are a blur; a voice in her mind, her memories being attacked and almost devoured as the world poured in around her, the loss of power and the sudden quiet after the storm that was her thoughts.

“it’s about time that you come back to us,” a honey-warm voice says afterwards when she is still reeling, a wide smile framed by the the remnants of fire and long, long ears. “we have a century-long mission to complete, hun.”

a glass is raised to her lips.

 

* * *

 

for the first time in her life- no, no. not her whole life- the static is gone. her thoughts dance over memories once covered and hidden behind a blanket of noise, a life she had once thought had too little experience to write how she did suddenly full of maturity.

she straightens, takes a breath, closes her eyes. everything is so quiet, even with these str- her family talking around her, even with the people who make her whole at her side.

had fisher’s static really been that loud?

she realizes that someone is talking to her and her mind lifts high out of that fog like a triumphant eagle, soaring above what had been her life for years.

“-sorry that you had to forget, everyone forgot except me and just-” magnus _(her brother her family her spirit gods how could she have those memories slip away)_ looks so guilty and she only wraps him in a hug, her small frame being enveloped by his.

“it doesn’t matter now,” she says softly, carefully.

“the hunger’s coming, we’re all here, and we can defeat it once and for all.”

 

* * *

 

she stands high above the darkness streaked with color, a staff in her hands and her family at her side, and her heart is lifted high, clear as a lake on a summer day.

_this is it._


	4. and in the wind i'd taste the dreams of distant lives

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh god, this was a mess of a fifteen minutes.
> 
> did this for a word war challenge thing: write for 15 minutes, see how far you get.  
> i did a drabble based off of my own hc: magnus has more of a connection to divination than just the relic.  
> have fun!
> 
> title is from the mute by radical face

whispers of futures long ahead filter through his mind, unbroken and just flowing through him. he is a ghost with the water of the past and present filling his thoughts, his dreams, his wonderings.

he doesn’t pay it much mind. after all, it’s just silly things. a town of pillars and feathers and ravens falling down, the bright smile of a kind young boy, watching a dragonborn and an orc kiss in front of a cheering group-

his mind has always been too creative for his own good. his mother had smiled and given him a pat on the shoulder for his work and he had beamed, beamed bright and loud and run out laughing to enjoy the day.

it didn’t matter. he just had an active imagination.

when the hunger falls and everything he knows is wiped out, he panics, he finds himself on a new world with these six people and so many animals. everything is different and his imagination can barely take it all in and just-

he turns to tarot cards, bullshitting readings so many times over the course of their journey. he picks them up a few cycles in and a lady gravely hands them to him- they’re simple and beautiful and he’s already forgotten what they all mean by the time he gets back to the starblaster.

taako snorts when he sees them.

“what, pal, gonna become a divination wizard? bullshit your way into having magic?”

magnus just laughs bright and loud and pulls something out of his mind- what’s the use of having an active mind if you never used it? he had never been an artist, a storyteller, but the ideas he had were always new and fun and just-

well. over the years, doing these fake readings was the most fun he had sometimes. a deck worn down by use, rough fingers rubbing at the edges of the cards, worn down every year as time passes.

the first time he just chuckles and pulls out the shiny new cards, the simple little things that they are, and lays a few down. “pick any of ‘em! doesn’t matter. i’ll tell you what’ll happen to you!”

taako rolls his eyes and only picks one up at lup’s urging (“cmon, koko! it’ll be a blast! you’ll have true love in your future or some shit like that!”), smirking as magnus takes it and makes a face like he’s had a realization.

“oh…..oh shit, taako, this is a cool one…..”

“well? tell me what it is, ruff boi.”

“you’re going to stop cooking.”

silence falls. from the corner, lucretia peers over her journal, amused.

“holy _shit,_ magnus! talk about something that’ll never happen!” the room is suddenly filled with everyone’s laughter- magnus’ booming chuckle, taako and lup’s cackles, lucretia’s giggles-

and that is what barry walks in to see, staring at the four others in the room with such a confused look that it sends them all back into peals of laughter.

“oh gods, the l- the look on your face, barold!” lup has red in her cheeks and laughter in her eyes and none of them can do anything but fall apart, settling down to listen to magnus bullshit stories of the future and have a good time.

over the years, it is a crutch.

something to bring laughter on the darkest of days, something to pass the time on the most boring. it helps when taako dies on an underwater mission and lup refuses to come out (“hey, did you know that you’ll just be, like, an accessory some day? a pretty rad one, too.”) and when he and lucretia are laying on the deck in the middle of a peaceful night (“pretty sure the cards are telling me that you’ll live in the moon one day, creesh. it’ll be great.”) and just….

it helps them to heal.

it builds them up.

he never expected for them to become reality but then again, the century didn’t exist, did it? he just remembers a mother who loved him and growing up with woodworking and eventually coming to raven’s roost and the dreams were acting up, something was wrong- but nothing was wrong.

_he just had an active imagination, didn’t he?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this killed me to write


	5. she moves like her body’s got a fire in it

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i didnt even fucking plan on writing today and someone goes "WORD WAR NOW" and im just. welp might as well be useful  
> broke yesterday's 707 words in 15 minutes with an 803 here about lup's relationship with fire and now my arms hurt
> 
> editing drabbles is for the weak here's the raw unedited stuff
> 
> title is from tea, milk & honey by oh pep!

lup has a... _unique_ relationship with fire.

back then, in the older days, she was but a child, an ember sparking in her hands and her eyes lighting up as their relatives watched warily. taako was another odd one, items changing in his hands, and it was the last straw for their relatives; they kicked them out right after they showed those signs, citing fae children, and they were on the road just as soon as they could walk well.

her fire lit their nights then.

not long after, they were the equivalent of teenagers, her flashy tricks and taako’s other dazzles combining with their cooking to make them a must-have on caravans and odd wagons. they had no home then, and the fire was still in her eyes, in her heart, in her soul as they stared at the night sky.

“koko, do you think we’ll ever have a permanent home one day?” she was fumbling around in common during the daylight but here, with her brother, their elven tongue and custom cant murmured in hushed tones.

“fuck homes,” her brother had spat, staring up at the sky with a bitterness she rarely really saw in him. their home was a touchy subject; they were perfect, two halves of a whole, but their edges turned sharp on certain subjects. for taako it was home, it was anything permanent-

she sighed and lit up a spark, playing with fire in the quiet hum of the night as she distracted her brother from his jaded, tired snarls.

so many years later, young adults eternally, her fire was not a distraction or merely for simple aspects of survival but it was to attack those who went after them, who saw a pretty face and thought ‘they’ll do in the rings’ or who wanted her brother for his pretty looks. they’d get called fae-elves, creatures who could bewitch those unwary souls, but she paid them no mind as her fire whipped around her, was a protective force beyond what taako could conjure up.

she was the protector, the lioness, the eagle soaring above the crowd.

she was radiant, and her brother wasn’t a fighter but she was and she’d protect him until the day she died.

_(“hey, lulu?”_

_“koko? what is it?”_

_“i’m so tired of having to fight.”_

_“well…i’ll do it for you, okay? you can just focus on scamming people and getting their money and i’ll always be there to back you up if you need it.”_

_“always?”_

_“always.”)_

later, ever later, they were watching their world get destroyed and fire sparked under her skin, blazed in her soul, and she could blast the ship she was on without hesitation and she would if it wasn’t for taako’s horrified staring at the outside world, at the black-color-streaked mass hurtling towards them at a speed barely slower than they could go.

her fire was unleashed after they were somewhere else, somewhere foreign, and it burned and burned and she didn’t pay any mind to the forest until taako’s arms were around her, tight and comforting, and she broke down to cry.

taako cared, he cared so much but he kept it in, he changed it to something else; she burned and burned eternally with her rage, her sorrow, and she’d be damned if anyone would ever be able to stop her except taako.

cycles, cycles passed; they could all tame her flame now and her rage was poured into a different project many times later, her rage towards the hunger and towards everything that had happened (that caused lucretia to harden too much, that caused magnus to carve and carve and carve some days without stopping, that made taako curl around her so tightly some nights as if he was afraid of letting her go) became the gauntlet.

oh, _oh,_ the gauntlet.

she hated to think of it after it was out in the world, when fire caused black glass to spread across cities, and she had to do something about it. some days she burned and none of the crew could calm her, not even taako- her fire was killing so many people, so many towns, and besides crying and crying and crying all she could do was burn.

she burned so well that it was what she had to put out into the world, huh?

she would fix it. she would go and lock it up so nobody could find it, and they’d all be _safe_ , these people, the thrall would be unable to get them if nobody could get to it, right?

the note was left unassumingly, the fire in her heart and in her eyes and in her lips giving it a carefree feel, a soft touch, a loving note to them all, the blaze burning high.

_be back soon._


	6. i can’t change even if i try

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im back, fuckers

taako wasn’t the loudest person, the sharpest looking, the most fashionably intimidating person around when he was younger.

well, he’d like to think so, but the fact of the matter was that he just wasn’t. he jumped around with his sister, the other half of his soul, his close twin, and they followed caravans, camped under the stars, hid around in the forgotten places of cities.

he was a quieter child, then. obsessed with cooking and baking although they often couldn’t do it, learning by trial and error how to steal and pickpocket and take things.

lup was the louder one, especially back then and still now, and he would always be grateful for it.

a distraction, a sharp call when someone was looking too closely at him, someone who was always willing to step in front of him (although he would always do the same for her). they were each other’s lives, and that was all that mattered.

years and years later, they would have a better life, one among the stars and the planes and eventually settling down to live out their years contently.

but that was later.

before the turmoil, before the laughter, they were just two kids and taako was the one who started stealing nicer clothes, a too-big wizard’s hat, a few wands as they started to pick up magic.

magic, magic, magic.

when he was younger, he had thought that magic was only for the wealthy, only for those who were deemed worthy. but as he was able to change materials so that they could cook, and as lup managed to light their campfire with only a wand, their worlds- changed.

they started becoming more confident. less wary street urchins (on the outside, at least; they were even more wary on the inside) and more budding wizards, taking pride in their fledgeling skills as they could market their dual skills- the taaco twins, able to cook and do some pretty decent magic.

later on, taako would remember their fluidity, the way they expertly moved around eachother even back then, even when there should’ve been mistakes. as the years passed they only improved but it had taken such a short time to become so comfortable in their work.

sometimes, it made him smile.

anyways.

taako remembered the nights where they’d cook extra just to keep for themselves, sweets made in the middle of the night from transmuted materials to laugh over under the stars, laying out under the expanse a distance away from the caravan to whisper and giggle and wave their arms out.

space always seemed so distant, then.

and then suddenly- it wasn’t.

it wasn’t like they had expected to get into the ipre. they had sent in their applications laughing, grown as young elven adults with lanky limbs and sharp points, slim smiles with cackles and some would’ve thought they were the same person if not for their hairstyles.

they hadn’t expected to get in.

they had.

lup connected with the others chosen easily but- taako hung back. he was good. even now he was quieter (but not as quieter as the bookworm that tucked herself into the corners of the rooms), but he spoke in sarcastic quips and harsh smiles and said nothing as the others realized that- that, well, this was his way of showing affection. sometimes.

and then the years stretched on. they left their world a crumbling wreck, devoured by a mass of darkness and color, and in the future he would only remember greg grimaldis. everyone else was just...dust on the wind.

(he didn’t think she would notice his lack of optimism, the way his eyes flickered away when their group talked about their homeworld, gathered together some nights to drink his special hot cocoa- but she said nothing. he didn’t notice.)

the only constant was his sister- and the others. the other five who wormed their way into his life, all the way from the loud, optimistic magnus to the shy bookworm that was Lucretia who slowly came out of her shell.

he didn’t notice it either, but he did the same.

his quips had less bite to them, his smiles were more genuine sometimes even though he hid it, he always hid it- but they got to look past that, to knock their shoulders against his when he said something not-quite-venomous, smiling and still talking to him.

lucretia was almost like- a second sister to him, not that she’d ever replace lup. he didn’t know why he only really bonded with lucretia in that way but...they had quiet moments. neither required the other to speak, really. their ventures out into worlds where it was just the two of them on the trip tended to be relaxing, quiet.

not like that could make up for her destroying his life.

after the century, after the day and story and song, after he lost a family and a sister and gained it all back eventually, he refused to see her, to talk to her, to hear her voice.

maybe he was too scared of the chance that he still loved her. not that he’d think that, but- his mind went in circles, whispering and murmuring and wrapping around him, and when they finally had a real meeting after all of those years, neither of them spoke.

they sat on the deck of the starblaster, barely used but still there, and sipped hot cocoa as they stared up at the stars.

(he ignored the way that kravitz smiled knowingly the next day when he got home, the way lup laughed and hugged him and barry watched and smiled-)

he was alone, he had been with lup, he had had a family, it had been taken away, and it was torn but-

but it would mend.

even if he was ever caught saying something so optimistic, he would die. his brand was precious, really.

(“hey, krav?” his fingers traced along cold ebony skin, laying on a couch as fantasy chopped played on the fantasy tv.

“mm?”

“maybe things’ll be alright, in the end.”

he ignored what had to be a smug fuckin’ smile on his lover’s face, not seeing the way his eyes softened as he looked down at the elf.

the world moved on.)


End file.
